The
following translation was undertaken from a desire to lay before the
English-speaking people the full treasury of epical beauty, folklore,
and mythology comprised in The
Kalevala,
the national epic of the Finns. A brief description of this peculiar
people, and of their ethical, linguistic, social, and religious life,
seems to be called for here in order that the following poem may be
the better understood.

Finland
(Finnish, Suomi
or Suomenmaa,
the swampy region, of which Finland, or Fen-land is said to be a
Swedish translation,) is at present a Grand-Duchy in the
north-western part of the Russian empire, bordering on Olenetz,
Archangel, Sweden, Norway, and the Baltic Sea, its area being more
than 144,000 square miles, and inhabited by some 2,000,000 of people,
the last remnants of a race driven back from the East, at a very
early day, by advancing tribes. The Finlanders live in a land of
marshes and mountains, lakes and rivers, seas, gulfs, islands, and
inlets, and they call themselves Suomilainen,
Fen-dwellers. The climate is more severe than that of Sweden. The
mean yearly temperature in the north is about 27°F., and about
38°F., at Helsingfors, the capital of Finland. In the southern
districts the winter is seven months long, and in the northern
provinces the sun disappears entirely during the months of December
and January.

The
inhabitants are strong and hardy, with bright, intelligent faces,
high cheek-bones, yellow hair in early life, and with brown hair in
mature age. With regard to their social habits, morals, and manners,
all travellers are unanimous in speaking well of them. Their temper
is universally mild; they are slow to anger, and when angry they keep
silence. They are happy-hearted, affectionate to one another, and
honorable and honest in their dealings with strangers. They are a
cleanly people, being much given to the use of vapor-baths. This
trait is a conspicuous note of their character from their earliest
history to the present day. Often in the runes of The
Kalevala
reference is made to the "cleansing and healing virtues of the
vapors of the heated bathroom."

The
skull of the Finn belongs to the brachycephalic (short-headed) class
of Retzius. Indeed the Finn-organization has generally been regarded
as Mongol, though Mongol of a modified type. His color is swarthy,
and his eyes are gray. He is not inhospitable, but not over-easy of
access; nor is he a friend of new fashions. Steady, careful,
laborious, he is valuable in the mine, valuable in the field,
valuable on shipboard, and, withal, a brave soldier on land.

The
Finns are a very ancient people. It is claimed, too, that they began
earlier than any other European nation to collect and preserve their
ancient folk-lore. Tacitus, writing in the very beginning of the
second century of the Christian era, mentions the Fenni,
as he calls them, in the 46th chapter of his De
Moribus Germanoram.
He says of them: "The Finns are extremely wild, and live in
abject poverty. They have no arms, no horses, no dwellings; they live
on herbs, they clothe themselves in skins, and they sleep on the
ground. Their only resources are their arrows, which for the lack of
iron are tipped with bone." Strabo and the great geographer,
Ptolemy, also mention this curious people. There is evidence that at
one time they were spread over large portions of Europe and western
Asia.

Perhaps
it should be stated here that the copper, so often mentioned in The
Kalevala,
when taken literally, was probably bronze,
or "hardened copper," the amount and quality of the alloy
used being not now known. The prehistoric races of Europe were
acquainted with bronze implements.

It may
be interesting to note in this connection that Canon Isaac Taylor,
and Professor Sayce have but very recently awakened great interest in
this question, in Europe especially, by the reading of papers before
the British Philological Association, in which they argue in favor of
the Finnic origin of the Aryans. For this new theory these scholars
present exceedingly strong evidence, and they conclude that the time
of the separation of the Aryan from the Finnic stock must have been
more than five thousand years ago.

The
Finnish nation has one of the most sonorous and flexible of
languages. Of the cultivated tongues of Europe, the Magyar, or
Hungarian, bears the most positive signs of a deep-rooted similarity
to the Finnish. Both belong to the Ugrian stock of agglutinative
languages, i.e.,
those which preserve the root most carefully, and effect all changes
of grammar by suffixes attached to the original stein. Grimm has
shown that both Gothic and Icelandic present traces of Finnish
influence.

The
musical element of a language, the vowels, are well developed in
Finnish, and their due sequence is subject to strict rules of
euphony. The dotted ö
(equivalent to the French eu)
of the first syllable must be followed by an e
or an i.
The Finnish, like all Ugrian tongues, admits rhyme, but with
reluctance, and prefers alliteration. Their alphabet consists of but
nineteen letters, and of these, b,
c, d, f, g,
are found only in a few foreign words, and many others are never
found initial.

One of
the characteristic features of this language, and one that is
likewise characteristic of the Magyar, Turkish, Mordvin, and other
kindred tongues, consists in the frequent use of endearing
diminutives. By a series of suffixes to the names of human beings,
birds, fishes, trees, plants, stones, metals, and even actions,
events, and feelings, diminutives are obtained, which by their form,
present the names so made in different colors; they become more
naive, more childlike, eventually more roguish, or humorous, or
pungent. These traits can scarcely be rendered in English; for, as
Robert Ferguson remarks: "The English language is not strong in
diminutives, and therefore it lacks some of the most effective means
for the expression of affectionate, tender, and familiar relations."
In this respect all translations from the Finnish into English
necessarily must fall short of the original. The same might be said
of the many emotional interjections in which the Finnish, in common
with all Ugrian dialects, abounds. With the exception of these two
characteristics of the Ugrian languages, the chief beauties of the
Finnish verse admit of an apt rendering into English. The structure
of the sentences is very simple indeed, and adverbs and adjectives
are used sparingly.

Finnish
is the language of a people who live pre-eminently close to nature,
and are at home amongst the animals of the wilderness, beasts and
birds, winds, and woods, and waters, falling snows, and flying sands,
and rolling rocks, and these are carefully distinguished by
corresponding verbs of ever-changing acoustic import. Conscious of
the fact that, in a people like the Finns where nature and
nature-worship form the centre of all their life, every word
connected with the powers and elements of nature must be given its
fall value, great care has been taken in rendering these finely
shaded verbs. A glance at the mythology of this interesting people
will place the import of this remark in better view.

In the
earliest age of Suomi, it appears that the people worshiped the
conspicuous objects in nature under their respective, sensible forms.
All beings were persons. The Sun, Moon, Stars, the Earth, the Air,
and the Sea, were to the ancient Finns, living, self-conscious
beings. Gradually the existence of invisible agencies and energies
was recognized, and these were attributed to superior persons who
lived independent of these visible entities, but at the same time
were connected with them. The basic idea in Finnish mythology seems
to lie in this: that all objects in nature are governed by invisible
deities, termed haltiat,
regents or genii. These haltiat,
like members of the human family, have distinctive bodies and
spirits; but the minor ones are somewhat immaterial and formless, and
their existences are entirely independent of the objects in which
they are particularly interested. They are all immortal, but they
rank according to the relative importance of their respective
charges. The lower grades of the Finnish gods are sometimes
subservient to the deities of greater powers, especially to those who
rule respectively the air, the water, the field, and the forest.
Thus, Pilajatar, the daughter of the aspen, although as divine as
Tapio, the god of the woodlands, is necessarily his servant. One of
the most notable characteristics of the Finnish mythology is the
interdependence among the gods. "Every deity", says
Castrén, "however petty he may be, rules in his own sphere as a
substantial, independent power, or, to speak in the spirit of The
Kalevala,
as a self-ruling householder. The god of the Polar-star only governs
an insignificant spot in the vault of the sky, but on this spot he
knows no master."

The
Finnish deities, like the ancient gods of Italy and Greece, are
generally represented in pairs, and all the gods are probably wedded.
They have their individual abodes and are surrounded by their
respective families. The Primary object of worship among the early
Finns was most probably the visible sky with its sun, moon, and
stars, its aurora-lights, its thunders and its lightnings. The
heavens themselves were thought divine. Then a personal deity of the
heavens, coupled with the name of his abode, was the next conception;
finally this sky-god was chosen to represent the supreme Ruler. To
the sky, the sky-god, and the supreme God, the term Jumala
(thunder-home) was given.

In
course of time, however, when the Finns came to have more purified
ideas about religion, they called the sky Taivas
and the sky-god Ukko.
The word, Ukko, seems related to the Magyar Agg,
old, and meant, therefore, an old being, a grandfather; but
ultimately it came to be used exclusively as the name of the highest
of the Finnish deities. Frost, snow, hail, ice, wind and rain,
sunshine and shadow, are thought to come from the hands of Ukko. He
controls the clouds; he is called in The
Kalevala,
"The Leader of the Clouds," "The Shepherd of the
Lamb-Clouds," "The God of the Breezes," "The
Golden King," "The Silvern Ruler of the Air," and "The
Father of the Heavens." He wields the thunder-bolts, striking
down the spirits of evil on the mountains, and is therefore termed,
"The Thunderer," like the Greek Zeus, and his abode is
called, "The Thunder-Home." Ukko is often represented as
sitting upon a cloud in the vault of the sky, and bearing on his
shoulders the firmament, and therefore he is termed, "The Pivot
of the Heavens." He is armed as an omnipotent warrior; his fiery
arrows are forged from copper, the lightning is his sword, and the
rainbow his bow, still called Ukkon
Kaari.
Like the German god, Thor, Ukko swings a hammer; and, finally, we
find, in a vein of familiar symbolism, that his skirt sparkles with
fire, that his stockings are blue, and his shoes, crimson colored.

In the
following runes, Ukko here and there interposes. Thus, when the Sun
and Moon were stolen from the heavens, and hidden away in a cave of
the copper-bearing mountain, by the wicked hostess of the dismal
Sariola, he, like Atlas in the mythology of Greece, relinquishes the
support of the heavens, thunders along the borders of the darkened
clouds, and strikes fire from his sword to kindle a new sun and a new
moon. Again, when Lemminkainen is hunting the fire-breathing horse of
Piru, Ukko, invoked by the reckless hero, checks the speed of the
mighty courser by opening the windows of heaven, and showering upon
him flakes of snow, balls of ice, and hailstones of iron. Usually,
however, Ukko prefers to encourage a spirit of independence among his
worshipers. Often we find him, in the runes, refusing to heed the
call of his people for help, as when Ilmatar, the daughter of the
air, vainly invoked him to her aid, that Wainamoinen, already seven
hundred years unborn, might be delivered. So also Wainamoinen
beseeches Ukko in vain to check the crimson streamlet flowing from
his knee wounded by an axe in the hands of Hisi. Ukko, however, with
all his power, is by no means superior to the Sun, Moon, and other
bodies dwelling in the heavens; they are uninfluenced by him, and are
considered deities in their own right. Thus, Pćivć means both sun
and sun-god; Kun means moon and moon-god; and Tćhti and Ottava
designate the Polar-star and the Great Bear respectively, as well as
the deities of these bodies.

The
Sun and the Moon have each a consort, and sons, and daughters. Two
sons only of Pćivć appear in The
Kalevala, one
comes to aid Wainamoinen in his efforts to destroy the mystic
Fire-fish, by throwing from the heavens to the girdle of the hero, a
"magic knife, silver-edged, and golden-handled;" the other
son, Panu, the Fire-child, brings back to Kalevala the fire that bad
been stolen by Louhi, the wicked hostess of Pohyola. From this myth
Castrén argues that the ancient Finns regarded fire as a direct
emanation from the Sun. The daughters of the Sun, Moon, Great Bear,
Polar-star, and of the other heavenly dignitaries, are represented as
ever-young and beautiful maidens, sometimes seated on the bending
branches of the forest-trees, sometimes on the crimson rims of the
clouds, sometimes on the rainbow, sometimes on the dome of heaven.
These daughters are believed to be skilled to perfection in the arts
of spinning and weaving, accomplishments probably attributed to them
from the fanciful likeness of the rays of light to the warp of the
weaver's web.

The
Sun's career of usefulness and beneficence in bringing light and life
to Northland is seldom varied. Occasionally he steps from his
accustomed path to give important information to his suffering
worshipers. For example, when the Star and the Moon refuse the
information, the Sun tells the Virgin Mariatta, where her golden
infant lies bidden.

"Yonder
is thy
golden infant, There
thy holy babe lies
sleeping, Hidden
to his belt in
water, Hidden
in the reeds and
rushes."

Again
when the devoted mother of the reckless hero, Lemminkainen, (chopped
to pieces by the Sons Of Nana, as in the myth of Osiris) was raking
together the fragments of his body from the river of Tuoui, and
fearing that the sprites of the Death-stream might resent her
intrusion, the Sun, in answer to her entreaties, throws his Powerful
rays upon the dreaded Shades, and sinks them into a deep sleep, while
the mother gathers up the fragments of her son's body in safety. This
rune of The
Kalevala
is particularly interesting as showing the belief that the dead can
be restored to life through the blissful light of heaven.

Among
the other deities of the air are the Luonnotars,
mystic maidens, three of whom were created by the rubbing of Ukko's
hands upon his left knee. They forthwith walk the crimson borders of
the clouds, and one sprinkles white milk, one sprinkles red milk, and
the third sprinkles black milk over the hills and mountains; thus
they become the "mothers of iron," as related in the ninth
rune of The
Kalevala.
In the highest regions of the heavens, Untar, or Undutar, has her
abode, and presides over mists and fogs. These she passes through a
silver sieve before sending them to the earth. There are also
goddesses of the winds, one especially noteworthy, Suvetar (suve,
south, summer), the goddess of the south-wind. She is represented as
a kind-hearted deity, healing her sick and afflicted followers with
honey, which she lets drop from the clouds, and she also keeps watch
over the herds grazing in the fields and forests.

Second
only to air, water is the element held most in reverence by the Finns
and their kindred tribes. "It could hardly be otherwise,"
says Castrén, "for as soon as the soul of the savage began to
suspect that the godlike is spiritual, super-sensual, then, even
though he continues to pay reverence to matter, he in general values
it the more highly the less compact it is. He sees on the one hand
how easy it is to lose his life on the surging waves, and on the
other, he sees that from these same waters he is nurtured, and his
life prolonged." Thus it is that the map of Finland is to this
day full of names like Pyhäjärvi
(sacred lake) and Pyhäjoki
(sacred river). Some of the Finlanders still offer goats and calves
to these sacred waters; and many of the Ugrian clans still sacrifice
the reindeer to the river Ob. In Esthonia is a rivulet, Vöhanda,
held in such reverence that until very recently, none dared to fell a
tree or cut a shrub in its immediate vicinity, lest death should
overtake the offender within a year, in punishment for his sacrilege.
The lake, Eim, is still held sacred by the Esthonians, and the
Eim-legend is thus told by F. Thiersch, quoted also by Grimm and by
Mace da Charda:—

"Savage,
evil men dwelt by its borders. They neither mowed the meadows which
it watered, nor sowed the fields which it made fruitful, but robbed
and murdered, insomuch that its clear waves grew dark with the blood
of the slaughtered men. Then did the lake Him mourn, and one evening
it called together all its fishes, and
rose aloft with them into the air.
When the robbers heard the sound, they exclaimed: 'Eim hath arisen;
let us gather its fishes and treasures.' But the fishes had departed
with the lake, and nothing was found on the bottom but snakes, and
lizards, and toads. And Eim rose higher, and higher, and hastened
through the air like a white cloud. And the hunters in the forest
said: 'What bad weather is coming on!' The herdsmen said: 'What a
white swan is flying above there!' For
the whole night the lake hovered among the stars,
and in the morning the reapers beheld it sinking. And from the swan
grew a white ship, and from the ship a dark train of clouds; and a
voice came from the waters: 'Get thee hence with thy harvest, for I
will dwell beside thee.' Then they bade the lake welcome, if it would
only bedew their fields and meadows; and it sank down and spread
itself out in its home to the full limits. Then the lake made all the
neighborhood fruitful, and the fields became green, and the people
danced around it, so that the old men grew joyous as the youth."

The
chief water-god is Ahto, on the etymology of which the Finnish
language throws little light. It is curiously like Ahti, another name
for the reckless Lemminkainen. This water-god, or "Wave-host,"
as he is called, lives with his "cold and cruel-hearted spouse,"
Wellamo, at the bottom of the sea, in the chasms of the Salmon-rocks,
where his palace, Ahtola, is constructed. Besides the fish that swim
in his dominions, particularly the salmon, the trout, the whiting,
the perch, the herring, and the white-fish, he possesses a priceless
treasure in the Sampo, the talisman of success, which Louhi, the
hostess of Pohyola, dragged into the sea in her efforts to regain it
from the heroes of Kalevala. Ever eager for the treasures of others,
and generally unwilling to return any that come into his possession,
Ahto is not incapable of generosity. For example, once when a
shepherd lad was whittling a stick on the bank of a river, he dropped
his knife into the stream. Ahto, as in the fable, "Mercury and
the Woodman," moved by the tears of the unfortunate lad, swam to
the scene, dived to the bottom, brought up a knife of gold, and gave
it to the young shepherd. Innocent and honest, the herd-boy said the
knife was not his. Then Ahto dived again, and brought up a knife of
silver, which he gave to the lad, but this in turn was not accepted.
Thereupon the Wave-host dived again, and the third time brought the
right knife to the boy who gladly recognized his own, and received it
with gratitude. To the shepherd-lad Ahto gave the three knives as a
reward for his honesty.

A
general term for the other water-hosts living not only in the sea,
but also in the rivers, lakes, cataracts, and fountains, is Ahtolaiset
(inhabitants of Ahtola), "Water-people," "People of
the Foam and Billow," "Wellamo's Eternal People." Of
these, some have specific names; as Allotar (wave-goddess),
Koskenneiti (cataract-maiden), Melatar (goddess of the helm), and in The
Kalevala
these are sometimes personally invoked. Of these minor deities, Pikku
Mies (the Pigmy) is the most noteworthy. Once when the
far-outspreading branches of the primitive oak-tree shut out the
light of the sun from Northland, Pikku Mies, moved by the entreaties
of Wainamoinen, emerged from the sea in a suit of copper, with a
copper hatchet in his belt, quickly grew from a pigmy to a gigantic
hero, and felled the mighty oak with the third stroke of his axe. In
general the water-deities are helpful and full of kindness; some,
however, as Wetehilien and Iku-Turso, find their greatest pleasure in
annoying and destroying their fellow-beings.

Originally
the Finlanders regarded the earth as a godlike existence with
personal powers, and represented as a beneficent mother bestowing
peace and plenty on all her worthy worshipers. In evidence of this we
find the names, Maa-emć (mother-earth), and Maan-emo (mother of the
earth), given to the Finnish Demeter. She is always represented as a
goddess of great powers, and, after suitable invocation, is ever
willing and able to help her helpless sufferers. She is according to
some mythologists espoused to Ukko, who bestows upon her children the
blessings of sunshine and rain, as Gé is wedded to Ouranos, Jordh to
Odhin, and Papa to Rangi.

Of the
minor deities of the earth, who severally govern the plants, such as
trees, rye, flax, and barley, Wirokannas only is mentioned in The
Kalevala.
Once, for example, this "green robed Priest of the Forest"
abandoned for a time his presidency over the cereals in order to
baptize the infant-son of the Virgin Mariatta. Once again Wirokannas
left his native sphere of action, this time making a most miserable
and ludicrous failure, when he emerged from the wilderness and
attempted to slay the Finnish Taurus, as described in the runes that
follow. The agricultural deities, however, receive but little
attention from the Finns, who, with their cold and cruel winters, and
their short but delightful summers, naturally neglect the cultivation
of the fields, for cattle-raising, fishing, and hunting.

The
forest deities proper, however, are held in high veneration. Of these
the chief is Tapio, "The Forest-Friend," "The Gracious
God of the Woodlands." He is represented as a very tall and
slender divinity, wearing a long, brown board, a coat of tree-moss,
and a high-crowned hat of fir-leaves. His consort is Mielikki, "The
Honey-rich Mother of the Woodland," "The Hostess of the
Glen and Forest." When the hunters were successful she was
represented as beautiful and benignant, her hands glittering with
gold and silver ornaments, wearing ear-rings and garlands of gold,
with hair-bands silver-tinseled, on her forehead strings of pearls,
and with blue stockings on her feet, and red strings in her shoes.
But if the game-bag came back empty, she was described as a hateful,
hideous thing, robed in untidy rags, and shod with straw. She carries
the keys to the treasury of Metsola, her husband's abode, and her
bountiful chest of honey, the food of all the forest-deities, is
earnestly sought for by all the weary hunters of Suomi. These deities
are invariably described as gracious and tender-hearted, probably
because they are all females with the exception of Tapio and his son,
Nyrikki, a tall and stately youth who is engaged in building bridges
over marshes and forest-streams, through which the herds must pass on
their way to the woodland-pastures. Nyrikki also busies himself in
blazing the rocks and the trees to guide the heroes to their favorite
hunting-grounds. Sima-suu (honey-mouth), one of the tiny daughters of
Tapio, by playing on her Sima-pilli
(honey-flute), also acts as guide to the deserving hunters.

Hiisi,
the Finnish devil, bearing also the epithets, Juntas, Piru, and
Lempo, is the chief of the forest-demons, and is inconceivably
wicked. He was brought into the world consentaneously with Suoyatar,
from whose spittle, as sung in The
Kalevala,
he formed the serpent. This demon is described as cruel, horrible,
hideous, and bloodthirsty, and all the most painful diseases and
misfortunes that ever afflict mortals are supposed to emanate from
him. This demon, too, is thought by the Finlanders to have a hand in
all the evil done in the world.

Turning
from the outer world to man, we find deities whose energies are used
only in the domain of human existence. "These deities,"
says Castrén, "have no dealings with the higher, spiritual
nature of man. All that they do concerns man solely as an object in
nature. Wisdom and law, virtue and justice, find in Finnish mythology
no protector among the gods, who trouble themselves only about the
temporal wants of humanity." The Love-goddess was Sukkamieli
(stocking-lover). "Stockings," says Castrén gravely, "are
soft and tender things, and the goddess of love was so called because
she interests herself in the softest and tenderest feelings of the
heart." This conception, however, is as farfetched as it is
modern. The Love-deity of the ancient Finns was Lempo, the
evil-demon. It is more reasonable therefore to suppose that the Finns
chose the son of Evil to look after the feelings of the human heart,
because they regarded love as an insufferable passion, or frenzy,
that bordered on insanity, and incited in some mysterious manner by
an evil enchanter.

Uni is
the god of sleep, and is described as a kind-hearted and welcome
deity. Untamo is the god of dreams, and is always spoken of as the
personification of indolence. Munu tenderly looks after the welfare
of the human eye. This deity, to say the least is an oculist of long
and varied experience, in all probability often consulted in Finland
because of the blinding snows and piercing winds of the north. Lemmas
is a goddess in the mythology of the Finns who dresses the wounds of
her faithful sufferers, and subdues their pains. Suonetar is another
goddess of the human frame, and plays a curious and important part in
the restoration to life of the reckless Lemminkainen, as described in
the following runes. She busies herself in spinning veins, and in
sewing up the wounded tissues of such deserving worshipers as need
her surgical skill.

Other
deities associated with the welfare of mankind are the Sinettaret and
Kankahattaret, the goddesses respectively of dyeing and weaving.
Matka-Teppo is their road-god, and busies himself in caring for
horses that are over-worked, and in looking after the interests of
weary travellers. Aarni is the guardian of hidden treasures. This
important office is also filled by a hideous old deity named
Mammelainen, whom Renwall, the Finnish lexicographer, describes as
"femina
maligna, matrix serpentis, divitiarum subterranearum custos,"
a malignant woman, the mother of the snake, and the guardian of
subterranean treasures. From this conception it is evident that the
idea of a kinship between serpents and hidden treasures frequently
met with in the myths of the Hungarians, Germans, and Slavs, is not
foreign to the Finns.

Nowhere
are the
inconsistencies of human theory and practice more curiously and
forcibly shown than in the custom in vogue among the clans of Finland
who are not believers in a future life, but, notwithstanding, perform
such funereal ceremonies as the burying in the graves of the dead,
knives, hatchets, spears, bows, and arrows, kettles, food, clothing,
sledges and snow-shoes, thus bearing witness to their practical
recognition of some form of life beyond the grave.

The
ancient Finns occasionally craved advice and assistance from the
dead. Thus, as described in The
Kalevala,
when the hero of Wainola needed three words of master-magic wherewith
to finish the boat in which he was to sail to win the mystic maiden
of Sariola, he first looked in the brain of the white squirrel, then
in the mouth of the white-swan when dying, but all in vain; then he
journeyed to the kingdom of Tuoni, and failing there, he "struggled
over the points of needles, over the blades of swords, over the edges
of hatchets" to the grave of the ancient wisdom-bard, Antero
Wipunen, where he "found the lost-words of the Master." In
this legend of The
Kalevala,
exceedingly interesting, instructive, and curious, are found,
apparently, the remote vestiges of ancient Masonry.

It
would seem that the earliest beliefs of the Finns regarding the dead
centred in this: that their spirits remained in their graves until
after the complete disintegration of their bodies, over which Kalma,
the god of the tombs, with his black and evil daughter, presided.
After their spirits had been fully purified, they were then admitted
to the Kingdom of Manala in the under world. Those journeying to
Tuonela were required to voyage over nine seas, and over one river,
the Finnish Styx, black, deep, and violent, and filled with hungry
whirlpools, and angry waterfalls.

Like
Helheim of Scandinavian mythology, Manala, or Tuonela, was considered
as corresponding to the upper world. The Sun and the Moon visited
there; fen and forest gave a home to the wolf, the bear, the elk, the
serpent, and the songbird; the salmon, the whiting, the perch, and
the pike were sheltered in the "coal-black waters of Manala."
From the seed-grains of the death-land fields and forests, the
Tuoni-worm (the serpent) had taken its teeth. Tuoui, or Mana, the god
of the under world, is represented as a hard-hearted, and frightful,
old personage with three iron-pointed fingers on each hand, and
wearing a hat drawn down to his shoulders. As in the original
conception of Hades, Tuoni was thought to be the leader of the dead
to their subterranean home, as well as their counsellor, guardian,
and ruler. In the capacity of ruler he was assisted by his wife, a
hideous, horrible, old witch with "crooked, copper-fingers
iron-pointed," with deformed head and distorted features, and
uniformly spoken of in irony in The
Kalevala
as "hyva
emanta,"
the good hostess; she feasted her guests on lizards, worms, toads,
and writhing serpents. Tuouen Poika, "The God of the Red
Cheeks," so called because of his bloodthirstiness and constant
cruelties, is the son and accomplice of this merciless and hideous
pair.

Three
daughters of Tuoni are mentioned in the runes, the first of whom, a
tiny, black maiden, but great in wickedness, once at least showed a
touch of human kindness when she vainly urged Wainamoinen not to
cross the river of Tuoui, assuring the hero that while many visit
Manala, few return, because of their inability to brave her father's
wrath. Finally, after much entreaty, she ferried him over the Finnish
Styx, like Charon, the son of Erebus and Nox, in the mythology of
Greece. The second daughter of Tuoni is Lowyatar, black and blind,
and is described as still more malignant and loathsome than the
first. Through the East-wind's impregnation she brought forth the
spirits of the nine diseases most dreaded by mankind, as described in
the 45th Rune of The
Kalevala;

The
third daughter of Tuoni combines the malevolent and repugnant
attributes of her two sisters, and is represented as the mother and
hostess of the impersonal diseases of mankind. The Finns regarded all
human ailments as evil spirits or indwelling devils, some formless,
others taking the shapes of the most odious forms of animal life, as
worms and mites; the nine, however, described above, were conceived
to have human forms.

Where
the three arms of the Tuoni river meet a frightful rock arises,
called Kipu-Kivi, or Kipuvuori, in a dungeon beneath which the
spirits of all diseases are imprisoned. On this rock the third
daughter of Tuoui sits, constantly whirling it round like a
millstone, grinding her subjects until they escape and go forth to
torture and slay the children of men; as in Hindu mythology, Kali
(black) sits in judgment on the dead.

Various
other spiritual powers than gods and goddesses are held in high
reverence by the Finns. Tontu is represented as a kind-hearted
house-spirit, a sort of diminutive Cyclops, and offerings of bread
and broth are made to him every morning. Putting a mare's collar on
one's neck and walking nine times around a church is thought to be a
certain means of attracting one to the place desired. Para is a
mystical, three-legged being, constructed in many ways, and which,
according to Castrén, attains life and action when its possessor,
cutting the little finger of his left hand, lets three drops of blood
fall upon it, and at the same time pronouncing the proper magic word.
The possessor, by whatever means, of this mystic being, is always
supplied with abundance of milk and cheese. The Maahiset are the
dwarfs of Finnish mythology. Their abode is under stumps, trees,
blocks, thresholds and hearth-stones. Though exceedingly minute and
invisible to man they have human forms. They are irritable and
resentful, and they punish with ulcers, tetter, ringworms, pimples,
and other cutaneous affections, all those who neglect them at
brewings, bakings, and feastings. They punish in a similar manner
those who enter new houses without making obeisance to the four
corners, and paying them other kindly attentions; those who live in
untidy houses are also likewise punished. The Kirkonwaeki
(church-folk) are little deformed beings living under the altars of
churches. These misshapen things are supposed to be able to aid their
sorrowing and suffering worshipers.

Certain
beasts, and birds, and trees, are held sacred in Finland. In The
Kalevala
are evident traces of arctolatry, bear-worship, once very common
among the tribes of the north, Otso, the bear, according to Finnish
mythology, was born on the shoulders of Otava, in the regions of the
sun and moon, and "nursed by a goddess of the woodlands in a
cradle swung by bands of gold between the bending branches of budding
fir-trees." His nurse would not give him teeth and claws until
he had promised never to engage in bloody strife, or deeds of
violence. Otso, however, does not always keep his pledge, and
accordingly the hunters of Finland find it comparatively easy to
reconcile their consciences to his destruction. Otso is called in the
runes by many endearing titles as "The Honey-Eater,"
"Golden Light-Foot," "The Forest-Apple,"
"Honey-Paw of the Mountains," "The Pride of the
Thicket," "The Fur-robed Forest-Friend." Ahava, the
West-wind, and Penitar, a blind old witch of Sariola, are the parents
of the swift dogs of Finland, just as the horses of Achilles, Xanthos
and Belios, sprang from Zephyros and the harpy Podarge.

As to
birds, the duck, according to The
Kalevala,
the eagle, according to other traditions, lays the mundane egg, thus
taking part in the creation of the world. Puhuri, the north-wind, the
father of Pakkanen (frost) is sometimes personified as a gigantic
eagle. The didapper is reverenced because it foretells the approach
of rain. Linnunrata (bird-path) is the name given to the Milky-way,
due probably to a myth like those of the Swedes and Slavs, in which
liberated songs take the form of snow-white dovelets. The cuckoo to
this day is sacred, and is believed to have fertilized the earth with
his songs. As to insects, honey-bees, called by the Finns,
Mehilainen, are especially sacred, as in the mythologies of many
other nations. Ukkon-koiva (Ukko's dog) is the Finnish name for the
butterfly, and is looked upon as a messenger of the Supreme Deity. It
may be interesting to observe here that the Bretons in reverence
called butterflies, "feathers from the wings of God."

As to
inanimate nature, certain lakes, rivers, springs, and fountains, are
held in high reverence. In the
Kalevala
the oak is called Pun Jumalan (God's tree). The mountain-ash even to
this day, and the birch-tree, are held sacred, and peasants plant
them by their cottages with reverence.

Respecting
the giants of Finnish mythology, Castrén is silent, and the
following notes are gleaned from the
Kalevala,
and from Grimm's Teutonic
Mythology.
"The giants," says Grimm, "are distinguished by their
cunning and ferocity from the stupid, good-natured monsters of
Germany and Scandinavia." Soini, for example a synonym of
Kullervo, the here of the saddest episode of the
Kalevala
when only three days old, tore his swaddling clothes to tatters. When
sold to a forgeman of Karelia, he was ordered to nurse an infant, but
he dug out the eyes of the child, killed it, and burned its cradle.
Ordered to fence the fields, he built a fence from earth to heaven,
using entire pine-trees for fencing materials, and interweaving their
branches with venomous serpents. Ordered to tend the herds in the
woodlands, he changed the cattle to wolves and bears, and drove them
home to destroy his mistress because she had baked a stone in the
centre of his oat-loaf, causing him to break his knife, the only
keepsake of his people.

Regarding
the heroes of the
Kalevala,
much discussion has arisen as to their place in Finnish mythology.
The Finns proper regard the chief heroes of the Suomi epic,
Wainamoinen, Ilmarinen, and Lemminkainen, as descendants of the
Celestial Virgin, Ilmatar, impregnated by the winds when Ilma (air),
Light, and Water were the only material existences. In harmony with
this conception we find in the
Kalevala,
a description of the birth of Wainamoinen, or Vaino, as he is
sometimes called in the original, a word probably akin to the Magyar Ven,
old. The Esthonians regard these heroes as sons of the Great Spirit,
begotten before the earth was created, and dwelling with their
Supreme Ruler in Jumala.

The
poetry of a people with such an elaborate mythology and with such a
keen and appreciative sense of nature and of her various phenomena,
was certain, sooner or later, to attract the attention of scholars.
And, in fact, as early as the seventeenth century, we meet men of
literary tastes who tried to collect and interpret the various
national songs of the Finns. Among these were Palmsköld and Peter
Bang. They collected portions of the national poetry, consisting
chiefly of wizard-incantations, and all kinds of pagan folk-lore.
Gabriel Maxenius, however, was the first to publish a work on Finnish
national poetry, which brought to light the beauties of the
Kalevala.
It appeared in 1733, and bore the title: De
Effectibus Naturalibus.
The book contains a quaint collection of Finnish poems in lyric
forms, chiefly incantations; but the author was entirely at a loss
how to account for them, or how to appreciate them. He failed to see
their intimate connection with the religious worship of the Finns in
paganism.

The
next to study the Finnish poetry and language was Daniel Juslenius, a
celebrated bishop, and a highly-gifted scholar. In a dissertation,
published as early as 1700, entitled, Aboa
vetus et nova,
he discussed the origin and nature of the Finnish language; and in
another work of his, printed in 1745, he treated of Finnish
incantations, displaying withal a thorough understanding of the
Finnish folk-lore, and of the importance of the Finnish language and
national poetry. With great care he began to collect the songs of
Suomi, but this precious collection was unfortunately burned.

Porthan,
a Finnish scholar of great attainments, born in 1766, continuing the
work of Juslenius, accumulated a great number of national songs and
poems, and by his profound enthusiasm for the promotion of Finnish
literature, succeeded in founding the Society of the Fennophils,
which to the present day, forms the literary centre of Finland. Among
his pupils were E. Lenquist, and Chr. Ganander, whose works on
Finnish mythology are among the references used in preparing this
preface. These indefatigable scholars were joined by Reinhold Becker
and others, who were industriously searching for more and more
fragments of what evidently was a great epic of the Finns. For
certainly neither of the scholars just mentioned, nor earlier
investigators, could fail to see that the runes they collected,
gathered round two or three chief heroes, but more especially around
the central figure of Wainamoinen, the hero of the following epic.

The
Kalevala
proper was collected by two great Finnish scholars, Zacharias
Topelius and Elias Lönnrot. Both were practicing physicians, and in
this capacity came into frequent contact with the people of Finland.
Topelius, who collected eighty epical fragments of the
Kalevala,
spent the last eleven years of his life in bed, afflicted with a
fatal disease. But this sad and trying circumstance did not dampen
his enthusiasm. His manner of collecting these songs was as follows:
Knowing that the Finns of Russia preserved most of the national
poetry, and that they came annually to Finland proper, which at that
time did not belong to Russia, he invited these itinerant Finnish
merchants to his bedside, and induced them to sing their heroic
poems, which he copied as they were uttered. And, when he heard of a
renowned Finnish singer, or minstrel, he did all in his power to
bring the song-man to his house, in order that he might gather new
fragments of the national epic. Thus the first glory of collecting
the fragments of the
Kalevala
and of rescuing it from literary oblivion, belongs to Topelius. In
1822 he published his first collections, and in 18317 his last.

Elias
Lönnrot, who brought the whole work to a glorious completion, was
born April 9, 1802. He entered the University of Abo in 1822, and in
1832, received the degree of Doctor of Medicine from the University
of Helsingfors. After the death of Castrén in 1850, Lönnrot was
appointed professor of the Suomi (Finnish) language and literature in
the University, where he remained until 1862, at which time he
withdrew from his academical activity and devoted himself exclusively
to the study of his native language, and its epical productions. Dr.
Lönnrot had already published a scholarly treatise, in 1827, on the
chief hero of The
Kalevala,
before he went to Sava and Karjala to glean the songs and parts of
songs front the lips of the people. This work was entitled: De
Wainainoine priscorum Fennorum numine.
In the year 1828, he travelled as far as Kajan, collecting poems and
songs of the Finnish people, sitting by the fireside of the aged,
rowing on the lakes with the fishermen, and following the flocks with
the shepherds. In 1829 he published at Helsingfors a work under the
following title: Kantele
taikka Suomee Kansan sek vazhoja että nykysempia Runoja ja Lauluja
(Lyre, or Old and New Songs and Lays of the Finnish Nation). In
another work edited in 1832, written in Swedish, entitled: Om
Finnarues Magiska Medicin (On
the Magic Medicine of the Finns), he dwells on the incantations so
frequent in Finnish poetry, notably in The
Kalevala.
A few years later he travelled in the province of Archangel, and so
ingratiated himself into the hearts of the simple-minded people that
they most willingly aided him in collecting these songs. These
journeys were made through wild fens, forests, marshes, and
ice-plains, on horseback, in sledges drawn by the reindeer, in
canoes, or in some other forms of primitive conveyance. The
enthusiastic physician described his journeyings and difficulties
faithfully in a paper published at Helsingfors in Swedish in 1834. He
had the peculiar good luck to meet an old peasant, one of the oldest
of the runolainen
in the Russian province of Wuokiniem, who was by far the most
renowned minstrel of the country, and with whose closely impending
death, numerous very precious runes would have been irrevocably lost.

The
happy result of his travels throughout Finland, Dr. Lönnrot now
commenced to arrange under the central idea of a great epic, called Kalevala,
and in February, 1835, the manuscript was transmitted to the Finnish
Literary Society, which had it published in two parts. Lönnrot,
however, did not stop here; he went on searching and collecting, and,
in 1840, had brought together more than one thousand fragments of
epical poetry, national ballads, and proverbs. These he published in
two works, respectively entitled, Kanteletar
(Lyre-charm), and The
Proverbs of the Suomi People,
the latter containing over 1700 proverbs, adages, gnomic sentences,
and songs.

His
example was followed by many of his enthusiastic countrymen, the more
prominent of whom are Castrén, Europćus, Polén and Reniholm.
Through the collections of these scholars so many additional parts of
the epical treasure of Finland were made public that a new edition of
the
Kalevala
soon became an imperative necessity. The task of sifting, arranging,
and organizing the extensive material, was again allotted to Dr.
Lönnrot, and in his second editions of The
Kalevala,
which appeared in 1849, the epic, embracing fifty runes and 22,793
lines, had reached its mature form. The
Kalevala
was no sooner published than it attracted the attention of the
leading scholars of Europe. Men of such world-wide fame as Jacob
Grimm, Steinthal, Uhland, Carričre and Max Müller hastened to
acknowledge its surpassing value and intrinsic beauty. Jacob Grimm,
in a separate treatise, published in his Kleinere
Schriften, said
that the genuineness and extraordinary value of the
Kalevala
is easily proved by the fact that from its mythological ideas we can
frequently interpret the mythological conceptions of the ancient
Germans, whereas the poems of Ossian manifest their modern origin by
their inability to clear up questions of old Saxon or German
mythology. Grimm, furthermore, shows that both the Gothic and
Icelandic literatures display unmistakable features of Finnish
influence.

Max
Müller places The
Kalevala
on a level with the greatest epics of the world. These are his words:

"From
the mouths of the aged an epic poem has been collected equalling the
Iliad in length and completeness; nay, if we can forget for a moment,
all that we in our youth learned to call beautiful, not less
beautiful. A Finn is not a Greek, and Wainamoinen was not a Homer
[Achilles?]; but if the poet may take his colors from that nature by
which he is surrounded, if he may depict the men with whom he lives,
the
Kalevala
possesses merits not dissimilar from those of the Iliad,
and will claim its place as the fifth national epic of the world,
side by side with the Ionian Songs, with the Mahabharata,
the Shalinameth,
and the Nibelunge."

Steinthal
recognizes but four great national epics, viz., the Iliad,
Kalevala, Nibelunge
and the Roland
Songs.

The
Kalevala
describes Finnish nature very minutely and very beautifully. Grimm
says that no poem is to be compared with it in this respect, unless
it be some of the epics of India. It has been translated into several
European languages; into Swedish by Alex. Castrén, in 1844; into
French prose by L. LeDuc, in 1845; into German by Anton Schiefner, in
1852; into Hungarian by Ferdinand Barna, in 1871; and a very small
portion of it — the legend of Aino — into English, in 1868, by
the late Prof. John A. Porter, of Yale College. It must remain a
matter of universal regret to the English-speaking people that Prof.
Porter's life could not have been spared to finish the great work he
had so beautifully begun.

Some
of the most convincing evidences of the genuineness and great age of
the
Kalevala
have been supplied by the Hungarian translator. The Hungarians, as is
well known, are closely related to the Finns, and their language, the
Magyar dialect, has the same characteristic features as the Finnish
tongue. Barna's translation, accordingly, is the best rendering of
the original. In order to show the genuineness and antiquity of the
Kalevala,
Barna adduces a Hungarian book written by a certain Peter
Bornemissza, in 1578, entitled Ördögi
Kisertetekröl
(on Satanic Specters), the unique copy of which he found in the
library of the University of Budapest. In this book Bornemissza
collected all the incantations (ráolvasások)
in use among Hungarian country-people of his day for the expulsion of
diseases and misfortunes. These incantations, forming the common
stock of all Ugrian peoples, of which the Finns and Hungarians are
branches, display a most satisfactory sameness with the numerous
incantations of the
Kalevala
used for the same purpose. Barna published an elaborate treatise on
this subject; it appeared in the, Transactions of the Hungarian
Academy of Sciences, Philological Department, for 1870. Again, in
1868, twenty-two Hungarian deeds, dating from 1616-1660, were sent to
the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, as having been found in the
Hegyalja, where the celebrated wine of Tokay is made. These deeds
contained several contracts for the sale of vineyards, and at the end
of each deed the customary cup of wine was said to have been emptied
by both parties to the contract. This cup of wine, in the deeds, was
termed, "Ukkon's cup." Ukko, however, is the chief God
according to Finnish mythology, and thus the coincidence of the
Magyar Ukkon
and the Finnish Ukko
was placed beyond doubt.

The
Kalevala
(the Land of Heroes) relates the ever-varying contests between the
Finns and the "darksome Laplanders", just as the Iliad
relates the contests between the Greeks and the Trojans. Castrén is
of the opinion that the enmity between the Finns and the Lapps was
sung long before the Finns had left their Asiatic birth-place.

A
deeper and more esoteric meaning of the
Kalevala,
however, points to a contest between Light and Darkness, Good and
Evil; the Finns representing the Light and the Good, and the Lapps,
the Darkness and the Evil. Like the Niebelungs, the heroes of the
Finns woo for brides the beauteous maidens of the North; and the
similarity is rendered still more striking by their frequent inroads
into the country of the Lapps, in order to possess themselves of the
envied treasure of Lapland, the mysterious Sampo, evidently the
Golden Fleece of the Argonautic expedition. Curiously enough public
opinion is often expressed in the runes, in the words of an infant;
often too the unexpected is introduced after the manner of the Greek
dramas, by a young child, or an old man.

The
whole poem is replete with the most fascinating folk-lore about the
mysteries of nature, the origin of things, the enigmas of human
tears, and, true to the character of a national epic, it represents
not only the poetry, but the entire wisdom and accumulated experience
of a nation. Among others, there is a profoundly philosophical trait
in the poem, indicative of a deep insight into the workings of the
human mind, and into the forces of nature. Whenever one of the heroes
of the
Kalevala
wishes to overcome the aggressive power of an evil force, as a wound,
a disease, a ferocious beast, or a venomous serpent, he achieves his
purpose by chanting the origin of the inimical force. The thought
underlying this idea evidently is that all evil could be obviated had
we but the knowledge of whence and how it came.

The
numerous myths of the poem are likewise full of significance and
beauty, and the
Kalevala
should be
read between the lines,
in order that the fall meaning of this great epic may be
comprehended. Even such a hideous impersonation as that of
Kullerwoinen, is rich with pointed meaning, showing as it does, the
incorrigibility of ingrained evil. This legend, like all others of
the poem, has its deep-running stream of esoteric interpretation. The
Kalevala,
perhaps, more than any other, uses its lines on the surface in
symbolism to point the human mind to the brighter gems of truth
beneath.

The
three main personages, Wainamoinen, the ancient singer, Ilmarinen,
the eternal forgeman, and Lemminkainen, the reckless wizard, as
mentioned above, are conceived as being of divine origin. In fact,
the acting characters of the
Kalevala
are mostly superhuman, magic beings. Even the female actors are
powerful sorceresses, and the hostess of Pohyola, especially, braves
the might of all the enchanters of Wainola combined. The power of
magic is a striking feature of the poem. Here, as in the legends of
no other people, do the heroes and demi-gods accomplish nearly
everything by magic. The songs of Wainamoinen disarm his opponents;
they quiet the angry sea; they give warmth to the new sun and the new
moon which his brother, Ilmarinen, forges from the magic metals; they
give life to the spouse of Ilmarinen, which the "eternal
metal-artist" forges from gold, silver, and copper. In fact we
are among a people that endows everything with life, and with human
and divine attributes. Birds, and beasts, and fishes, and serpents,
as well as the Sun, the Moon, the Great Bear, and the stars, are
either kind or unkind. Drops of blood find speech; men and maidens
transform themselves into other shapes and resume again their native
forms at will; ships, and trees, and waters, have magic powers; in
short, all nature speaks in human tongues.

The
Kalevala
dates back to an enormous antiquity. One reason for believing this,
lies in the silence of the
Kalevala
about Russians, Germans, or Swedes, their neighbors. This evidently
shows that the poem must have been composed at a time when these
nations had but very little or no intercourse with the Finns. The
coincidence between the incantations adduced above, proves that these
witch-songs date from a time when the Hungarians and the Finns were
still united as one people; in other words, to a time at least 3000
years ago. The whole poem betrays no important signs of foreign
influence, and in its entire tenor is a thoroughly pagan epic. There
are excellent reasons for believing that the story of Mariatta,
recited in the 50th Rune, is an ante-Christian legend.

An
additional proof of the originality and independent rise of the
Kalevala
is to be found in its metre. All genuine poetry must have its
peculiar verse, just as snow-flakes cannot exist without their
peculiar crystalizations. It is thus that the Iliad is inseparably
united, and, as it were, immersed in the stately hexametre, and the
French epics, in the graceful Alexandrine verse. The metre of the
Kalevala
is the "eight-syllabled trochaic, with the part-line echo,"
and is the characteristic verse of the Finns. The natural speech of
this people is poetry. The young men and maidens, the old men and
matrons, in their interchange of ideas, unwittingly fall into verse.
The genius of their language aids to this end, inasmuch as their
words are strongly trochaic.

This
wonderfully versatile metre admits of keeping the right medium
between the dignified, almost prancing hexameter, and the shorter
metres of the lyrics. Its feet are nimble and fleet, but yet full of
vigor and expressiveness. In addition, the
Kalevala
uses alliteration, and thus varies the rhythm of time with the rhythm
of sound. This metre is especially fit for the numerous expressions
of endearment in which the Finnish epic abounds. It is more
especially the love of the mother for her children, and the love of
the children for their mother, that find frequent and ever-tender
expression in the sonorous lines of the
Kalevala.
The Swedish translation by Castrén, the German, by Schiefner, and
the Hungarian, by Barna, as well as the following English
translation, are in the original metre of the
Kalevala.

To
prove that this peculiar and fascinating style of verse is of very
ancient origin, the following lines have been accurately copied from
the first edition in Finnish of the
Kalevala,
collated by Dr. Lönnrot, and published in 1835 at Helsingfors, the
quotation beginning with the 150th line of the 2nd Rune:

As to
the architecture of the
Kalevala,
it stands midway between the epical ballads of the Servians and the
purely epical structure of the Iliad.
Though a continuous whole, it contains several almost independent
parts, as the contest of Youkahainen, the Kullervo episode, and the
legend of Mariatta.

By
language-masters this epic of Suomi, descending unwritten from the
mythical age to the present day, kept alive from generation to
generation by minstrels, or song-men, is regarded as one of the most
precious contributions to the literature of the world, made since the
time of Milton and the German classics.

Acknowledgment
is hereby made to the following sources of information used in the
preparation of this work: to E. Lenquist's De
Superstitione veterum Fennorum theoretica et practica;
to Chr. Ganander's Mythologia
Fennica;
to Becker's De
Vainamoine;
to Max Müller's Oxford
Essays;
to Prof. John A. Porter's Selections
from the Kalevala;
to the writings of the two Grimms; to Latham's Native
Races of the Russian Empire;
to the translations of the
Kalevala
by Alex. Castrén, Anton Schiefner, L. LeDuc and Ferdinand Barna; and
especially to the excellent treatises on the
Kalevala,
and on the Mythology of the Finns, by Macc Da Charda and Alex.
Castrén; to Prof. Heléna Klingner, of Cincinnati, a linguist of
high rank, and who has compared very conscientiously the manuscript
of the following pages with the German translation of the
Kalevala
by Anton Schiefner; to Dr. Emil Reich, a native Hungarian, a close
student of the Ugrian tongues, who, in a most thorough manner, has
compared this translation with the Hungarian by Ferdinand Barna, and
who, familiar with the habits, customs, and religious notions of the
Finns, has furnished much valuable material used in the preparation
of this preface; and, finally, to Prof. Thomas C. Porter, D.D.,
LL.D., of Lafayette College, who has become an authority on the
Kalevala
through his own researches for many years, aided by a long and
intimate acquaintance with Prof. A. F. Soldan, a Finn by birth, an
enthusiastic lover of his country, a scholar of great attainments,
acquainted with many languages, and once at the head of the Imperial
Mint at Helsingfors, the capital of Finland. Prof. Porter has very
kindly placed in the hands of the author of these pages, all the
literature on this subject at his command, including his own
writings; he has watched the growth of this translation with unusual
interest; and, with the eye of a gifted poet and scholar, he has made
two careful and critical examinations of the entire manuscript,
making annotations, emendations, and corrections, by which this work
has been greatly improved.

With
this prolonged introduction, this, the first English translation of
the
Kalevala,
with its many imperfections, is hesitatingly given to the public.

JOHN
MARTIN CRAWFORD.

October
1, 1887.

THE
KALEVALA.

PROEM.

MASTERED
by desire impulsive,By
a mighty inward urging,I
am ready now for singing,Ready
to begin the chantingOf
our nation's ancient folk-songHanded
down from by-gone ages.In
my mouth the words are melting,From
my lips the tones are gliding,From
my tongue they wish to hasten;When
my willing teeth are parted,When
my ready mouth is opened,Songs
of ancient wit and wisdomHasten
from me not unwilling.Golden
friend, and dearest brother,Brother
dear of mine in childhood,Come
and sing with me the stories,Come
and chant with me the legends,Legends
of the times forgotten,Since
we now are here together,Come
together from our roamings.Seldom
do we come for singing,Seldom
to the one, the other,O'er
this cold and cruel country,O'er
the poor soil of the Northland.Let
us clasp our hands togetherThat
we thus may best remember.Join
we now in merry singing,Chant
we now the oldest folk-lore,That
the dear ones all may hear them,That
the well-inclined may hear them,Of
this rising generation.These
are words in childhood taught me,Songs
preserved from distant ages,Legends
they that once were takenFrom
the belt of Wainamoinen,From
the forge of Ilmarinen,From
the sword of Kaukomieli,From
the bow of Youkahainen,From
the pastures of the Northland,From
the meads of Kalevala.These
my dear old father sang meWhen
at work with knife and hatchetThese
my tender mother taught meWhen
she twirled the flying spindle,When
a child upon the mattingBy
her feet I rolled and tumbled.Incantations
were not wantingOver
Sampo and o'er Louhi,Sampo
growing old in singing,Louhi
ceasing her enchantment.In
the songs died wise Wipunen,At
the games died Lemminkainen.There
are many other legends,Incantations
that were taught me,That
I found along the wayside,Gathered
in the fragrant copses,Blown
me from the forest branches,Culled
among the plumes of pine-trees,Scented
from the vines and flowers,Whispered
to me as I followedFlocks
in land of honeyed meadows,Over
hillocks green and golden,After
sable-haired Murikki,And
the many-colored Kimmo.Many
runes the cold has told me,Many
lays the rain has brought me,Other
songs the winds have sung me;Many
birds from many forests,Oft
have sung me lays n concordWaves
of sea, and ocean billows,Music
from the many waters,Music
from the whole creation,Oft
have been my guide and master.Sentences
the trees created,Rolled
together into bundles,Moved
them to my ancient dwelling,On
the sledges to my cottage,Tied
them to my garret rafters,Hung
them on my dwelling-portals,Laid
them in a chest of boxes,Boxes
lined with shining copper.Long
they lay within my dwellingThrough
the chilling winds of winter,In
my dwelling-place for ages.Shall
I bring these songs togetherFrom
the cold and frost collect them?Shall
I bring this nest of boxes,Keepers
of these golden legends,To
the table in my cabin,Underneath
the painted rafters,In
this house renowned and ancient?Shall
I now these boxes open,Boxes
filled with wondrous stories?Shall
I now the end unfastenOf
this ball of ancient wisdom,These
ancestral lays unravel?Let
me sing an old-time legend,That
shall echo forth the praisesOf
the beer that I have tasted,Of
the sparkling beer of barley.Bring
to me a foaming gobletOf
the barley of my fathers,Lest
my singing grow too weary,Singing
from the water only.Bring
me too a cup of strong-beer,It
will add to our enchantment,To
the pleasure of the evening,Northland's
long and dreary evening,For
the beauty of the day-dawn,For
the pleasure of the morning,The
beginning of the new-day.Often
I have heard them chanting,Often
I have heard them singing,That
the nights come to us singly,That
the Moon beams on us singly,That
the Sun shines on us singly;Singly
also, Wainamoinen,The
renowned and wise enchanter,Born
from everlasting EtherOf
his mother, Ether's daughter.